


Gun Safety

by Tseecka



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Dominance kink, Guns, M/M, Teaching, angst so much angst, irresponsible use of firearms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-24
Updated: 2012-07-24
Packaged: 2017-11-10 15:44:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/467952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tseecka/pseuds/Tseecka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sebastian doesn't like to admit it, but there's going to come a day when he's not fast enough, not sharp enough, or simply not in the right place at the right time; and he wants to be sure Jim can protect himself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gun Safety

**Author's Note:**

> Fic to back up my own angst-ridden headcanon: Jim had no idea how to use a gun before Sebastian taught him. As the sniper watched him put the muzzle in his mouth and pull the trigger from a fourth floor window half a block away, he couldn't help but blame himself for Jim's death.

“Yo.”

Seb leaned into the office, pushing the door open with one hand and rapping lightly against the jamb with the other. Jim glanced up at him, eyes narrowed over the sheaf of papers he was leafing through. He’d shucked his suit jacket, Sebastian noticed, sleeves pushed up to his elbows and tie loosened—it hung sloppily about his neck, at an angle. The expression on his face meant two things—he was bored as hell and pissed off to match, and Seb had to take a second to do a mental inventory and be certain he wasn’t the cause of the second. He didn’t think so; he hadn’t done much of anything the past few days, at least, and the job prior had gone off without a hiccup. He allowed himself to breathe again, and plastered a cocky smile on his face as he sauntered into the office, not waiting for an invite. Jim’s eyes narrowed further at that, but he didn’t say anything, just watched the sniper’s advance. 

Planting his hands on the edge of the desk, Sebastian leaned over, straight into Jim’s personal space, and ducked his head to read the papers upside down. _Ah _. That explained a lot of things. Straightening, he grasped the top of the stack in one hand and tugged it upwards, out of Jim’s grasp. An eyebrow went up, and the corners of Jim’s mouth curled further down. “Sebastian,” he growled warningly, but Seb just smirked, plucking up a binder clip from the neat little container and pinching the pages together. He tossed them to the side, landing them neatly in the little drawer Jim had neatly marked, “Inbox” and which Sebastian had, in a fit of pique one day, re-labelled “Shit to Deal With”. Jim had never bothered to remove the new label; Seb fancied that he liked it.__

“Don’t gimme that, boss,” he said reproachfully. “You need a break, whether you want to admit to it or not. You keep re-reading that contract, you’re gonna get so pissed off you’ll end up deciding Pendell and her bunch are more valuable dead than alive and I’ll have to hoof it over to Canada. I been there twice too often in the last few months.” 

Jim didn’t move, arms folded across his front and an expression of annoyance still on his features. “We’ve talked about you interrupting me while I’m working, Sebastian,” he growled, but it was half-hearted at best. 

Seb’s grin faded, and he matched Jim’s expression in gravity, becoming serious. “This is important, and like I said—you need a break.” He stepped back, putting a more respectful distance between himself and the desk, and Jim’s eyebrow went further at that. Seb spread his hands. “Please, boss. I have something for you.”

The wheeled chair rolled back across the parquet as Jim pushed himself back and stood, sighing heavily. “What you and I consider to be “important” are often two very different things, Sebastian. If you’ve interrupted me for another mid-afternoon booty call, I will end you.” Seb quirked a smile at that, but it faded as he held the door for Jim and watched him pass. 

“Sorry—not today.” Jim huffed, unfastening the buttons on his cuffs and tugging his shirt sleeves down as they walked down the hall. It was natural for Sebastian to take up his usual position, what Jim liked to affectionately call “at heel”—a pace behind and half a step to Jim’s left side. He guided Jim from there, a hand to his back or a tap on his shoulder, and that way led the smaller man through the warehouse. It was one of the older acquisitions Jim had made, and was largely unused. At the time he’d acquired it, he had had no idea of the scope his empire would one day cover, and he hadn’t even considered the need to purchase it under an alias. Not that the name Jim Moriarty meant anything to anyone—no one ever talked, no one ever tied anything back to him, but it was still an error from his past that he tried not to think about. 

Instead, he’d set it up as one of his less secret offices, and when Sebastian had come on, he’d taken over one of the two huge, cavernous storage spaces and built a makeshift range. It wasn’t ideal, wasn’t especially pretty—nothing like what the military had—but he didn’t need much. Didn’t need much practice, either, since Jim kept him busy enough that he didn’t really have to worry about losing his edge. But at times like this, when he was down for at least a couple of weeks between hits and he had nothing better to do, the range was good for a distraction. 

It was the range he was leading Jim to, now, and Jim turned to look at him as he opened the door into the echoing space. “What on earth are we doing here, ‘Bastian?” he drawled, hands going into his trouser pockets as he looked around the space speculatively. Sebastian brushed past him, going to one of the tall desks he’d set up at the end of each lane, and picking up a small handgun from the assortment that lay in military-neat arrangement. He gestured with it, motioning Jim over and with a brief huff of amusement Jim obeyed the request. 

Sebastian nodded, his face gone deadly serious, and he turned to face down the lane. He ejected the cartridge and checked it over, then pushed it home again. He picked up a silencer from the table and attached it, then raised the gun to shoulder height, two hands fisted around the butt. Without a word, he squeezed the trigger, and the muffled report of the shot hit Jim’s ears at the same time a bright white hole appeared in the paper target down the lane. 

Seb clicked the safety back on and placed the gun back on the table. He turned to Jim. “You’re going to learn to use this—to use all of these,” he said in a low voice. Jim rolled his eyes, groaning, but Sebastian grabbed his arm with one hand and shook him lightly. “Jim, I’m serious. You know ’m always there, and I’ve always got your back—but I’m not takin’ any chances. Not after what happened in Budapest, all right? I know you don’t like gettin’ your hands dirty, but shit can always go wrong, an’ I might not always be there to back you up.” Jim’s eyes narrowed at that, voice going icy. 

“The day you fail to be there to “back me up”, as you say, is the day you’re no longer useful to me.” Sebastian looked up from where he was fussing with the guns to meet Jim’s glare head on. 

“If I don’t have your back, *boss*, it’s because I’m already dead,” he replied gruffly. “Unlikely, since I’m damn good at what I do; but Budapest was a near miss and I’d rather it not happen again. Unless you’ve got a death wish…?”

“Hardly.” Jim sighed, reaching out and running his fingers along the cool metal of the various makes and models spread out in front of him. He hated guns, detested them; the weapons of a weak man, only to be used in extreme circumstances. A smart adversary used men as weapons, the way he used Sebastian. The sniper’s guns were merely an extension of himself, the same way a tiger’s claws were part and parcel of the beast itself. At the same time, however, he could see Sebastian’s point. Having the mark of a sniper’s scope suddenly disappear from the forehead of the man who was itching to put his hands around your neck was never a good sign, and less so when you had seven or eight of his henchmen standing ready the moment it did so. It was only due to luck and, he thought with just a hint of pride, the skill of his sniper that he’d managed to escape with all his limbs more or less intact and all his organs where they were supposed to be. 

He’d never seen Sebastian look frightened before—at least of something or someone other than him—and though he hadn’t shown it, he hadn’t been unmoved by the experience, either. It wasn’t one he was anxious to repeat. 

So, he allowed Seb to teach him his way around a gun. They worked their way through each piece the sniper had laid out on the bench, Seb’s weight against Jim’s back as he adjusted Jim’s grip, tipped his arms up, pressed his shoulders down, steadied his hands. Every time Seb gave him an order, Jim saw a spark of heat flare into his eyes, and it amused him to comply so readily, to give Seb a taste of what it was like to be in his position. Soon enough, every chamber was emptied, and there were more holes punched through the dark silhouettes on each paper than there were in the white areas around the outside, and Jim laid down the pistol he’d been using. Seb’s hands came down from where they’d been steadying his shoulders, wrapping around him, and he turned in their circle to press upwards for a kiss. 

Seb complied heartily, as Jim had known he would; the sniper’s arousal had been clear through their close proximity. He admired Seb’s resolve to follow through on his little training plan, though he couldn’t help but make a snide remark now and again about the sentiment behind it. Seb bore them quietly. He was too focused on making sure that Jim could handle himself around a gun, and he knew denying it was useless. Jim was a paycheque, three squares a day, a roof over his head and protection from the military enforcement that was still trying to hunt him down, but the thought of his death sent a spike of loss through Seb’s gut that had nothing to do with any of that. He took that pain and channeled it into his hands, his mouth, as he hoisted Jim onto the bench and pressed him close, their hands scattering the emptied firearms everywhere.

Jim laughed against his mouth, an honest laugh that lacked any of his usual derision. “What happened to gun safety, love?” he murmured, hands working at pulling Seb’s shirt out from his waistband so that he could get his hands under it to the pale, heated skin. 

“Fuck you, and fuck gun safety,” Seb growled back, nipping at his lips playfully. Jim abandoned his chest to grope around the table, until his hand closed around one of the guns. Grinning, he picked it up, bringing it up to his lips and licking an obscene stripe along the cold, harsh metal of the barrel. 

“Now there’s an idea,” he crooned, and Seb groaned in response, rushing forward to crash their mouths together and trapping Jim’s hand, and the gun with it, between their bodies.


End file.
